


butterfly

by stevenstamkos



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Timelines, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dreams, Gen, M/M, Not A Fix-It, Quebec Major Junior Hockey League
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-28
Updated: 2017-11-28
Packaged: 2019-02-07 21:53:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12850272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stevenstamkos/pseuds/stevenstamkos
Summary: Pierre-Luc Dubois: President’s Cup Champion, Memorial Cup Champion, World Juniors gold medalist, Montreal Canadiens player.If only it didn't feel so...wrong.





	butterfly

**Author's Note:**

  * For [velenoes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/velenoes/gifts).



> For Maddie, who is probably threatening me right now for taking Luc away from her and making him a Husky (look, Raven made him [sexy!](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DOFT8hIUEAANDLq.png)) when he is SUPPOSED TO BE AN EAGLE #OnceAnEagleAlwaysAnEagle
> 
> Many thanks to Chris, Hailey, and Lou for your help. Trust the process :)

> When Nick Roy was taken by Cape Breton in 2013 and chose not to report (resulting in a rule change for compensatory picks) it was par for the course when it came to the luck of the Screaming Eagles. A blow which felt crippling at the time, forcing some to even ask how the organization could absorb more letdown. Instead of stitching Roy on the back of a Black and Yellow jersey, when the dust settled after trading his rights, Cape Breton ended up with the 5th pick the following year. And with it they selected from Sainte Agathe des Monts, Quebec, Pierre Luc Dubois, in what should be viewed as a franchise altering moment.
> 
> [_Pierre Luc Dubois — A Story From Home_ ](http://leafshub.com/pierre-luc-dubois-a-story-from-home/)

 

 

CHICOUTIMI, Que. — The Cape Breton Screaming Eagles selected forward Nicolas Roy with the first overall pick of the 2013 Quebec Major Junior Hockey League draft on Saturday.

For months prior to the draft, Roy had made clear his intention to remain in his home province of Quebec, leading many to consider it a waste of a pick should Cape Breton select him. However, the team believes that they have put his fears to rest, and Roy appears satisfied with the organization’s assurances about the quality of education he will receive at the Cape.

“Going into the draft, we made it a priority to address each of Nicolas’ and his family’s concerns,” Screaming Eagles General Manager & Head Coach Marc-Andre Dumont said. “We’re excited for him to join us.”

Should Roy not report to training camp in the fall, the Screaming Eagles will receive the fifth overall pick and the last pick of the second round in the 2014 draft from the league as compensation.

 

* * *

 

The night before the draft, Luc dreams in black and yellow. In the dream, the Screaming Eagles select him fifth overall, fifteen years old, and Luc pulls on the black and yellow jersey in front of a thousand people.

He wakes up feeling a little off, like he’s lost something.

It’s probably not a sign, he thinks.

The Eagles don’t even have a first round pick, not after they took Nicolas Roy first overall in the draft last year. Luc remembers the drama. In the end, Nico Roy had reported to training camp after all, and everything had blown over pretty quickly, and a year later no one is talking about it anymore except as a fun fact, like _hey remember that time Cape Breton almost lost a first overall prospect_.

Luc is probably just like, nervous about the draft and overthinking his dream. He’s not going to be an Eagle, not unless he falls from projected third overall to the second round. And call him overconfident, but he has enough faith in himself to know that’s not going to happen. Probably.

A few hours later, the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies call his name, and Luc is pulling on the black and red jersey and smiling, smiling so hard and shaking hands and posing for a million pictures. This is good. Rouyn is gonna be a good team. It’s really fucking far from Rimouski, but at least it’s still Quebec. He could’ve ended up in like, Nova Scotia.

If he sees a flash of yellow out of the corner of his eye as he’s putting the jersey on, well, that’s probably just his imagination.

 

 

The first game of Luc’s major junior career is against Val-d’Or, and he doesn’t accomplish much more than drawing a penalty against #12 on the Foreurs. The Huskies don’t score on the powerplay; Luc isn’t even _on_ the powerplay cause he’s a fucking rookie, and the Foreurs score as soon as they’re back to even strength.

So he’s kind of pissed when the third period starts. He’s kind of physical. And #12 doesn’t fucking like that.

“Big hit on Gauthier,” Alex Fortin murmurs when Luc returns to the bench. “That was nice.”

“Thanks,” Luc says, to hide the fact that he’s gassed.

From the other bench, #12 makes a rude gesture at him.

“I think he likes you,” Forts says, before hopping over the boards to start his next shift.

 

 

Rouyn-Noranda is cold and beautiful, and the Huskies are okay. Luc plays hard, gets bounced around the lineup a bit, and scores a few goals.

They lose about as much as they win. That’s okay. It’s hockey; it’s ice and puck and net, and Luc loves it. He loves being a Husky. He can’t imagine any life but this one, waking up in his billet home in Rouyn-Noranda and skating with Waked and Fortin and Myers and the Lauzon brothers.

Except.

 

Luc has dreams sometimes.

They’re not like—They’re not those kinds of dreams. Okay yes, there are some of those, because he _is_ sixteen, but most of them aren’t.

Most of his dreams are about people, and everyone has their clothes on. Sometimes they play hockey, but not for the Huskies.

One time, he dreams about this guy with a missing front tooth and like, really fucking ginger hair, and the guy yells at him a lot in Russian. It’s not bad yelling though. It’s friendly yelling, Luc thinks, though he’s not entirely sure, since it’s in Russian. They’re skating without sticks, and Luc is behind, which is probably why he’s being yelled at. Maybe the guy is telling him to hurry up. He does speed up, but the guy must have rockets strapped to his feet or something because no matter how hard Luc skates, he only falls further and further behind, until he realizes that the guy is gone and he’s skating alone in an empty arena.

Other times, he dreams about mundane things, like going to school in a place that isn’t his high school, and going out for dinner with friends he doesn’t know. Little things that feel familiar.

He always wakes up feeling like everything’s just a bit off. Like someone shifted all his furniture a foot to the left, and the walls too, and the door, and Luc is still trying to walk a path that doesn’t exist anymore. He keeps hitting the walls, or stubbing his toe on the table that definitely isn’t supposed to be there. Metaphorically, that is. Luc is actually really graceful in real life.

“You ever have weird dreams?” he asks Philippe Myers.

Phil Myers is tall and easygoing and friendly. He’s polite enough to not look at Luc weirdly for the random questions, just leans on his stick and thinks for a moment.

“Not really,” he says in his Moncton-flavored French.

“I do,” Jérémy Lauzon says.

“Yeah, we know that the only thing you ever dream about is Ph—” Zach Lauzon starts, but his older brother elbows him in the ribs and the rest of the words are lost.

“What kind of dreams?” Phil asks patiently, ignoring the Lauzon brothers.

Luc shrugs. “Just like, weird ones. I keep dreaming that I’m playing for Cape Breton.”

“Oh god. Imagine playing for the Screagos.” Zach shakes his head, like the thought is too horrible to picture.

“Good thing they’re just dreams,” Jérémy agrees. “You’re better off here with us.”

Luc thinks so too, but he can’t quite shake that nagging feeling that he’s missing something.

 

They play Cape Breton twice a season, and Luc is weirdly nervous heading into their first meeting. The night before, he’d dreamt about playing for the Screaming Eagles again, and in the dream, he was on a line with the toothless Russian. They were hot fire, naturally.

The Huskies play a good road game at Centre 200 though, even if they’re a bit sloppy with penalties. Five minutes left in the first period, right after an Eagles power play opportunity expires, Evgeny Svechnikov looses a wrister that goes off the bar and into the Huskies net. Luc is on the ice for the goal, close enough to see Svechnikov take his mouthguard out and raise his arms, grinning as he shouts something in Russian at Lazarev, his linemate.

Evgeny Svechnikov is missing a tooth.

Luc can’t focus for the rest of the game. The Huskies come away with two points, but Luc goes pointless and is -1 to end the night, and he can’t stop staring at the Eagles bench.

 

“You okay tonight? You weren’t all there.”

Luc throws his jersey in the bin and shrugs out of his shoulder pads. “Just don’t fucking like Cape Breton,” he says.

Forts nods, understanding. “Yeah man, fuck the Eagles.”

Thank god they don’t have to see them again for a while.

 

 

Luc doesn’t like Cape Breton, but there’s one team he likes even less. It’s something that he loves about Rouyn: how fucking much everyone, teammates and fans alike, hate the Val-d’Or Foreurs. Except the Lauzons, but that’s because they’re _from_ Val-d’Or. Everyone else buys into the hype though.

Luc loves divisional rivalries.

Val-d’Or is a tough team to beat, the defending President’s Cup champions, and they fucking kill Rouyn like, five or six times during the season. It’s not always a loss for the Huskies when they meet up, but when it is, it’s often a blowout. Their worst losses always seem to come against the Foreurs. And among that talented team, well.

#12 from Val-d’Or is big and plays physical, and he has a natural goal-scorer’s touch, especially against Rouyn. Goals and points in almost every game...It’s hard to ignore the guy.

“God, he’s hard to defend against,” Jérémy mutters.

“Got a bit of a height advantage on you,” Luc says. He squirts some Gatorade into his mouth and watches as #12 waits for the faceoff, stick ready. “Hey, if I dropped the gloves with him, d’you think I’d win?”

“I’ve never seen Gauthier fight. But you’re a real piece of work, you know that, Duber? A real fucker on the ice when you want to be.”

Luc preens. #12 drops his shoulder and easily smears Forts into the boards.

The Huskies take the Foreurs to OT, but #12 scores two minutes into overtime to hand the Huskies another L. And he completes his hat trick. And gets first star.

Fucking Julien Gauthier.

 

It’s not like Luc really has an _issue_ with Gauthier specifically. Besides the fact that he’s, you know, a massive dick on the ice, and a Foreur.

The first time he wakes up after a dream about him, Luc gets up and takes a lap of his room before heading to the bathroom and taking a shower. A cold shower. A very cold shower.

The playoffs are starting tomorrow—today? It’s 4 am. They’re flying to Val-d’Or in a few hours, and then a few hours after that, puck drop.

Luc is calm. Luc is fine. Everything is fine.

 

They lose Game 6 in Rouyn-Noranda, down 9-2, and Gauthier gets _another_ hat trick during the series, and honestly, Luc would be pretty happy if they never have to see him again.

He barely sleeps that night, homesick and heartbroken over the first-round elimination, and when he does fall asleep, there’s nothing but darkness and heat and a voice in his ear whispering his name, too-soft and gentle. It makes Luc ache—in his heart, in his throat, and everywhere else.

He is half-awake already when he hears his dream self sigh and say, “ _Julien_.”

After he’s done with end-of-season responsibilities, he gets the fuck out of Rouyn-Noranda as fast as possible, and back in Rimouski, he doesn’t have any more freaky ass dreams.

 

 

Luc accidentally runs into Evgeny Svechnikov in Florida. They’re both there for the draft: Luc because he’s been going to drafts all his life and his dad is a major junior coach, and Svechnikov because he’s getting drafted this year.

For a moment, they size each other up, but the draft isn’t about league rivalries. Svechnikov flashes him a smile—gap-toothed and friendly—before moving around him to get to his seat.

Svechnikov’s family follows behind him, and Luc steps out of the way so they can get past.

Evgeny Svechnikov has a little brother, some Russian kid who’s like, fifteen or something. He stares at Luc for a very long moment, a flat and kind of judgmental stare, and Luc almost wonders what the fuck he did to piss in this kid’s Cheerios. They’ve never met before; Luc is pretty sure that Evgeny Svechnikov is an import, so his family must all be in Russia.

“Andrei,” Evgeny says, beckoning, and Andrei Svechnikov gives Luc one more soul-piercing look before moving past him.

“What the fuck is with that kid,” Jérémy says from beside Luc. He turns and watches the Svechnikovs as they take their seats. “Did you fuck his sister or something?”

“No?” Luc says, but it comes out sounding like a question.

Jérémy only gives him a disbelieving look, similar to the one Andrei Svechnikov was giving him earlier. “Did you fuck his _brother_?”

“No! I didn’t. I don’t even know them. I only met his brother like, twice, and that was when we played Cape Breton. And we didn’t get up to anything, okay.” Andrei Svechnikov shoots him yet another look over his shoulder, and Luc steps behind Jérémy. “I don’t know what his deal is. Let’s just—Let’s go find Zach and Phil.”

At Phil’s name, Jérémy forgets about any Screaming Eagles and their weird family members. Which might have been what Luc was planning on happening. It’s really too easy with Jérémy.

They watch as Evgeny Svechnikov is drafted nineteenth overall by the Detroit Red Wings.

The next day, Boston takes Jérémy in the second round. Phil goes undrafted, which isn’t a surprise after the admittedly shitty offensive numbers he put up the past two seasons, but it’s disappointing anyway. Luc can see him smiling for Jérémy and trying to put on a good show, because it’s Phil, and Phil is like all the good things about Rouyn condensed into one person.

“You’re still draft eligible next year,” Luc offers, and Phil looks away, toward the corner where Jérémy is surrounded by his brothers and some Bruins staff members. There’s a sad smile on Phil’s face.

“I’m just happy for Jér,” he says softly.

God. Luc hugs him. Phil has to duck a little so it’s not uncomfortable, since Luc is shorter than him. Over his hunched shoulders, Luc can see Andrei Svechnikov staring at him again, unreadable.

 

 

His second season with Rouyn is better. They’re good—like, really fucking good. A lot of players are returning, and they’ve got a better feel for the team, and a lot more confidence. Phil has his breakout season right out of the gate after signing with Philly during the summer, and Luc can’t stop scoring, putting up points in almost every game.

The only team that really keeps pace with them is Val-d’Or, and mostly because of Gauthier. He always throws this look at Luc after he scores, like he’s challenging him or something, and it’s both frustrating and really fucking hot. Mostly frustrating though.

More than that, Luc is still having dreams. They’ve gotten more intense over time, like he’s getting snapshots of someone else’s life. Only the someone else looks an awful lot like him, except with the, you know, Screaming Eagles sweater, and whatever the fuck kind of obsession dream-him has with Julien Gauthier.

Luc and Gauthier both make Team QMJHL in November for the Canada-Russia series. It’s weird having the guy on his team suddenly, but they have surprisingly good chemistry, and Luc actually like, talks to the guy for once. It’s nothing more than on-ice stuff—“I’ll get open in the high slot” and “You come up the wing here”—but it’s okay. Julien Gauthier is very okay, to be honest, when he’s not playing for the Foreurs. And he's still very good at hockey.

But the series is over after two games, and after the trophy and the pictures, Julien seems perfectly happy to go back to being rivals.

 

They both make selection camp for World Juniors, the only two undrafted forwards. Julien isn’t on a line with Luc, and they’re not even rooming on the same floor in the hotel, so they only run into each other a few times off-ice in Etobicoke.

“Go ahead, you first,” Julien says, gesturing, when they’re both trying to get into the hotel elevator at the same time.

“Thanks, man,” Luc says.

He tries not to think about how the night before, he dreamt about Julien _again_ , and it was all kinds of hot, and he’d woken up very embarrassed. As the elevator doors close though, he finds himself staring at Julien’s hair, which had been very soft under his chin the night before, soft in a way that Julien’s mouth hadn’t been. In the dream, he means. Not in real life.

Julien catches him staring and cocks his head, curious. Luc looks away quickly.

Those fucking dreams. He keeps a careful distance in the elevator and tries not to be a complete idiot in front of Julien.

It doesn’t really matter in the end though, because Luc doesn’t make it past the first round of cuts. He goes back to Rouyn-Noranda and tries not to feel too bad about himself.

The Huskies play the Foreurs four times in late December and early January, and Luc tells himself he doesn't miss seeing #12 on the ice in green and gold. He _doesn’t_ , not really; it’s actually kind of nice to not have to block his shots. Those fuckers _hurt_.

(And he doesn’t look for #12 on Team Canada either, when he manages to catch World Junior games.)

Julien gets back from Helsinki in the second week of January, and he picks right up scoring on the Huskies again, two goals in his first game back with the Foreurs. Luc is almost happy to be slammed into the boards by the guy again, which is. Weird.

 

 

“Did you look at the draft rankings this morning?” Luc asks suddenly.

Julien pauses, hands still on his belt. “Yeah. Middle-to-late first round, they said.” He shrugs. “And look at you, best North American skater.” There’s a note of pride in his voice, which makes Luc’s heart flutter more than his words.

“It’s not a guarantee of anything.”

“Yeah, but everyone already thinks you’re going to be an Oiler or a Canuck. Take it as a W. Fourth or fifth overall’s not bad.”

Luc is quiet for a moment, thinking about the Combine interviews he had yesterday with Columbus and Buffalo. He doesn’t want to hope too hard, shooting for the top three, but it’s a possibility. “Could be Columbus. I think...the scouts said they liked me, and they wanted to know if I could be a centerman for them.”

“Sure you can,” Julien says easily. He drops his belt over the side of the bed and knee-walks over to Luc, sliding a hand behind his neck. “The draft’s not for another month though, and there’s not much we can do about it anymore. Stop psyching yourself up over it.” He kisses Luc, softly at first, and then harder when Luc reaches up and tangles his fingers in his hair.

It’s hard to keep thinking about the draft after that, hard to focus on anything but feeling.

Luc wakes up and stares at the ceiling for a long moment before sighing and reaching under the covers to take care of himself.

 

 

No one really talks about triple digits until the last few games of the season, when the league looks around and realizes that 1) the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies are at the top of the league with a good eleven points on second-place Val-d’Or, and 2) Luc is sitting pretty with 95 points and still two more games in hand.

“Our little brother doesn’t think you can do it,” Zach tells Luc during morning practice.

“Émile doesn’t know what the fuck he’s talking about,” Jérémy says, loyal as ever.

And Luc has never met a challenge he didn’t immediately eye up, so he says, “Yeah, for sure,” and then he scores two goals and two assists in their 7-3 torching of Drummondville that night. 99 points, sweet as anything, and still a game to go.

There’s a scary moment the day after the game when the league has to review a hit from behind on Barré-Boulet, and there’s a rumor that Luc is going to be suspended for the last game of the season and possibly the beginning of the playoffs. But the league only lets him off with a warning.

He finds net again in the final game against Gatineau, a goal and two helpers, and ends the season with 102 points. Triple digits, and in his draft year too, pretty enough for the scouts. That should do it for an early first round pick, even if the scouting reports are saying that his numbers are inflated by the all-star team he’s on.

The Huskies end the season 54-9-3-2, with 113 points and only nine regulation losses. In the playoffs, they sweep Drummondville in the first round, and it’s almost _easy_ to get to the President’s Cup finals. Fifteen games, twelve wins, six shutouts. Luc feels fucking untouchable.

Shawinigan next, and then the Cup. They fucking got this.

 

“We good?”

“So good.”

Luc fist bumps Forts’s glove as they head out of the dressing room to face Shawinigan. Game six.

They’re wearing their thirds, their lucky black thirds, and the Rouyn crowd is alive behind the glass. Luc grins up at the fans, tosses a few pucks over to some kids, and stick-taps Marchy’s goalie pads as he comes out from behind the net.

“Brick wall,” he promises Marchy.

Marchy raises his goalie stick, eyes crinkling behind his mask.

And then Luc is at center ice to take the opening draw, stick down, every muscle ready. Eyes on the puck. Eyes on the prize.

 

God they—They win the President’s Cup.

 

 

The Memorial Cup Tournament is a different beast altogether: tougher, more demanding, and the stakes are higher than ever. There’s no more best of seven. No second chances after the round robin. Rouyn wins their first game against the Brandon Wheat Kings, and then they lose the next two to the Red Deer Rebels and the London Knights.

Phil is all keyed up, fucking psyched out in a way that Luc hasn’t seen him before. He dropped the gloves against a Wheat King earlier in the tournament, and there’s the shadow of a bruise on his cheek.

“Chill the fuck out,” Luc says shortly, and Phil barely seems to hear him.

Jérémy does though. “He’s chill. He’s fine.” He gives Luc a sharp look and sticks with Phil for the rest of the day, heads close together.

The whole team’s on-edge. They really can’t lose the next game, the semi-final against Red Deer. If they lose, that’s it. They’re out.

They win against Red Deer. And then—God, fucking _London_.

Everyone knows about London. They’re the darling of the OHL—the darling of the CHL, probably. Fucking London Knights. Lost two in the first round of the OHL playoffs, and then swept the next three teams to win the J. Ross Robertson Cup. Went 3-0 in the round robin to advance to the Mem Cup final. They don’t just beat teams—they _slaughter_ them.

It’s all kinds of unfair that they have like, Marner and Tkachuk and Dvorak and Juolevi and a whole bunch of superstars. That’s the kind of team that no one wants to face, red-hot and riding a sixteen game win streak through the playoffs.

The beat reporters know it too, and they ask the Huskies some fucked up questions about whether they can even hope to beat London.

Luc gets kind of annoyed at that. Look, Rouyn isn’t a bad team, okay? He knows that like, people don’t pay as much attention to them because they’re in the Q and French and all, but. They’re fucking legit. “If we play as a team, we can do anything,” he says, or something like that anyway, the team byline.

Everyone’s dying to ask him about how he thinks this will affect his draft stock. Luc only smiles at that, hungry. Like a wolf.

No one really thinks the Huskies can beat London, but the thing is, they don’t have a choice.

Phil shows up before the game, face calm, hands steady. He looks okay. He looks like himself again, their rock on the blue line. When he makes his way over to his stall, his shoulders are relaxed, and he smiles at Jérémy as he passes. And the whole team breathes a little bit easier.

They can do this, too. Winning the biggest prize in junior hockey? Sure thing.

The game is fast and hard, and London is fucking ferocious. But the Huskies are good. They’re solid. They score twice, 2-1, and they’ve got London by the throat—

Dvorak scores with four minutes to go to tie the game.

“God! Fuck!” Luc spits, and he’s pissed at himself, pissed at the failed cross-ice pass that turned over the puck that led to the London goal. And there are NHL scouts in the stands, watching him, watching every move he makes on the ice and wondering if he’s the one for their team.

He slams into the bench, trying not to let his temper boil over, but he’s chewing on his mouthguard so aggressively he almost swallows it by accident.

“Duber! Keep your fucking cool!” Phil shouts as he hops over the boards, and it’s actually kind of encouraging, so Luc just. Sits back. Breathes. Tells himself to keep his fucking head on. Three minutes and tie game.

They don’t award an overtime point in games like this, in the final of the Memorial Cup. It’s winner takes all. But it’s not the end, not yet.

He’s on the ice to start overtime, and he gets in maybe three or four shifts before the Knights almost end it, Tkachuk coming in hot and snapping it from the point, but Marchy makes the save somehow, an impossible save. Luc barely has time to breathe before Forts retrieves the puck from the corner and throws it up-ice, a blind pass to no one, but Luc hung back at the blue line, Luc is alone. The Knights all joined the rush earlier and now they’re turning back and racing back to their zone, but Luc is all alone in front, the puck on his stick, just him and ice and the figure in green and gold in front of him.

Parsons is ready and steady at the edge of the paint, and Luc glances at him as he enters the zone fast, trying to guess at the tiny adjustments that Parsons is making with his glove and pads.

It feels like time slows down as Luc chases the puck down the ice, skates moving without conscious thought. Muscle memory. There’s no one else here. Dubois and Parsons and no one else.

He’s almost on top of Parsons, fakes tucking it in five-hole and sees Parsons finally commit, the pads coming down, the glove dropping, Parsons’s wide eyes behind his goalie mask—

The backhand shot lifts the puck beautifully over the lowered glove, finds net—

 

Luc crashes into the net, hanging onto the bar and lifting his legs clear of Parsons, but he feels himself kick the London goalie in the shoulder maybe, but that doesn’t fucking matter does it because the puck crossed the line before he hit the net, it fucking crossed—

 

He doesn’t think he’ll ever forget the feel of the Memorial Cup in his hands. Doesn’t think he’ll forget how it feels to lift it to the sky and kiss the cold metal and laugh until he loses his voice.

Luc wouldn’t give this up for anything, for the whole world.

 

 

Halfway through the Combine and the scouting interviews, Luc remembers a dream he had once, about a team that wanted him. He’d felt it, sitting in the room with a bunch of faceless guys, answering their questions. They wanted him to be their 1C someday, and their GM had shaken his hand and told him that his future would be bright. _With us_ , he didn’t say, but Luc felt it. He can’t remember which team it was though.

He also remembers other parts of the dream, hot hands and hotter mouth and the sound of his name in the dim light of his Combine hotel room, the soft clink of a belt hitting the floor. The sting of a bruise sucked into his neck.

Julien Gauthier only gives Luc a half-friendly smile when they see each other. He cut his hair recently. It looks really good.

They don’t hang out at all. They don’t really talk.

There’s really no reason for Luc to feel anything but happiness. He’s a Mem Cup champion. The scouts are projecting he’ll go top 10, maybe top 5 in the draft next month, a huge jump from the start of the season. He’s got everything he wants right now.

 

 

The Columbus head amateur scout takes a quick look around the packed room before putting his lips to the mic.

“The Columbus Blue Jackets are proud to select—”

For some reason he can’t name, Luc thinks suddenly that they’re going to say his name. Jarmo Kekalainen is looking around the crowd, and for one truly bizarre second, Luc thinks that the Columbus GM even looks at him. But then the head scout is finishing the pick, and Kekalainen isn’t looking at Luc after all.

“—from the London Knights, Matthew Tkachuk.”

The room goes loud as hundreds of people gasp and start talking at the same time, stunned over the pick. A few rows from Luc, Jesse Puljujärvi looks around, a lost kind of look on his face. Even from his seat, Luc can read his body language. _“Wasn’t it supposed to be me?”_

 _No_ , Luc thinks suddenly, surprising himself with how vicious the thought is. Columbus was never meant for Puljujärvi.

Matt Tkachuk looks kind of weird in navy blue, but he smiles widely and takes the pictures onstage and heads off to where Auston Matthews and Patrik Laine are waiting for him for the top-three photoshoot. Luc watches from the crowd, and his stomach twists with the feeling that something is very, very wrong.

His mom reaches over and takes his hand, squeezing a little. He only smiles at her. It’s just the nerves. It has to be.

Things are interrupted for a bit as the news breaks that the Habs have traded up, swapping places with the Oilers for the fourth overall pick. It takes a long time for the crowd to calm, obviously excited over the blockbuster that's just happened: a few players and prospects to Edmonton, a few to Montreal, and PK Subban in an Oilers jersey. And the fourth pick in Montreal's hands.

Luc guesses it might be for him. Montreal's been plenty interested for a while, and Luc's a local guy, so it's not a long shot that they grab him. He won the Mem Cup, and he’s a versatile forward and a big skater and he put up 102 points this season, good enough for third in QMJHL scoring.

And then Marc Bergevin from the Montreal Canadiens is onstage, and he’s speaking into the mic, and every muscle in Luc’s body freezes and then goes liquid when he hears the words.

“With the fourth pick, Montreal selects from the Memorial Cup-champion Rouyn-Noranda Huskies, Pierre-Luc Dubois.”

 

“Good birthday gift?”

Luc nods and hugs his mom, pressing his smile into her shoulder. Getting drafted to any NHL team is good; going top 5 is fucking amazing, especially since Rouyn typically doesn’t get a lot of luck in the NHL draft. His team traded up to get him; they wanted him that badly. He’s gonna be playing in Quebec, practically at home. The Habs. It’s a big fucking deal.

(Never mind how he feels about the Habs. He can get over it.)

Out of the corner of his eye, he thinks he sees someone: a young face, sad-looking, watching him from across the room. A face he hasn’t seen in a year. It looks like Andrei Svechnikov.

When he pulls back from his mom for a better look though, there’s no one there.

 

He dreams in snatches that night, half-drunk after spending the night out with friends and family even though he’s still underage in Buffalo.

At first, he’s skating with Phil and Jérémy and Forts, practicing their penalty killing, and it’s good and normal. It could be any other practice in Rouyn-Noranda. His teammates are laughing as they practice getting the puck out of their zone, and Luc goes into the other end to retrieve it once it’s been iced. When he gets back though, Phil and Jérémy and Forts are gone, and there are strangers in their place, waiting for him with smiles on their faces.

“Everything okay, Duber?”

The speaker is a big, friendly-looking guy, strong Russian accent and a missing tooth. Evgeny Svechnikov. He is wearing a Screaming Eagles practice jersey.

Luc blinks. “Yeah, man. I’m good,” he hears himself say. “Where’s Drizzy?”

“Here,” some guy, probably Drizzy, says. He’s also wearing an Eagles jersey. “What’s up, Dubes?”

“I want you to join the rush on this play. You’re a good player, just need to play with more confidence. I like you on my wing.”

He goes on, talking to each of the guys on the ice, calling them by names he doesn’t know and describing their playing styles even though he has no idea who the fuck they are or how they play. He’s never played with any of them before, since they’re, you know, Cape Breton. Dream-him knows though.

And then without warning, Svechnikov’s face fucking morphs into Jarmo Kekalainen’s, which is probably kind of weird and freaky, except it happens in a fraction of a second. Luc realizes that they’re not on the ice anymore; they’re standing on the stage in Buffalo.

Kekalainen is staring hard at Luc’s face. “Pierre-Luc Dubois,” he says, all serious and shit.

Luc’s fingers are tangled in the fabric of the Blue Jackets jersey he must’ve just put on. It smells like a new jersey, anyway.

“Welcome to Columbus,” Kekalainen is saying. He shakes Luc’s hand, and Luc smiles on automatic and keeps smiling into the flash of an invisible camera somewhere offstage.

The second Kekalainen lets go of him, Luc is standing in an empty room, white ceiling and white walls and white floor, and he feels—weightless, like he’s floating on air. He is very calm, for some reason.

Andrei Svechnikov is in front of him. Andrei Svechnikov is unhappy-looking, his brows drawn together, and he is saying in Russian that Luc understands, “Dubois. There’s something wrong. This is a _fantasy_. It’s not supposed to be happening. Listen to me— _Dubois_ —”

The sound of his alarm cuts through Svechnikov’s words, and Luc is falling, stomach dropping, until he wakes up in his hotel bed.

 

 

The Canadiens return Luc to Rouyn-Noranda at the end of the preseason. He doesn’t make an appearance in a single NHL game. He’s not ready yet, they say. They want him to spend another year in the Q developing his game and getting more comfortable with playing center. Luc knows that sticking with the team in his first year was a bit of a long shot, but it kind of stings, a little. But he knows what he’s gotta do. One more year in Rouyn. One more championship to bring home, and then: Montreal.

 

“Duber,” Forts sing-songs. He pops his bubble gum in Luc’s face, which is just Forts being cute as usual. “Nice to see you back with us, babe.”

Luc slaps his ass with the blade of his stick, grinning. “Couldn’t live without your pretty face.”

Forts makes a kissy face at him and laughs when Luc slaps his ass again. “Always good to have you on the team, Dubie. We gotta defend the Mem, you know? Keep it from the O.”

The team is mostly the same, still good, still stacked. They’re missing some firepower without Timo or Francis, but they’ve still got Forts and Gabe and Luc up front and a solid blue line with Phil and Jérémy and Zach, and Sammy’s inherited the net. They look good going into the season, good enough for another run at the Cup.

Good enough to defend the Cup.

“Yeah. Gonna win it again this year. Gonna fucking repeat.”

Forts looks impressed at the thought. “Wow. Sexy.”

And sure, it’s October and the season’s only just begun. Luc isn’t talking out of his ass though. They won the President’s Cup last year, and the Memorial Cup, beat the unbeatable London Knights and brought the Mem back to the Q for the first time since the Halifax Mooseheads did it in 2013. Why not again this year?

Shit, they can’t fucking say it to the _reporters_ or anything, but between Luc and the Huskies? They can dare to dream.

 

 

(Luc can say a lot about dreams, actually. Luc can write a whole fucking book about dreams.

He can write a fucking book _series_ about what it’s like to live a whole other life playing for the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. It’s a life without a President’s Cup, without a Memorial Cup. It’s a life where in his third year playing for the Eagles, Pierre-Luc Dubois is struggling and already considered a bust. It’s always a relief to wake up from those dreams.

He can probably also write about what it’s like to be in love, because he thinks, maybe in some dreams, that he might be in love.

He doesn’t really know how to feel about those.)

 

 

Phil and Jérémy are in love.

Luc isn’t jealous really. He’s happy for them. They hold hands during team meetings—under the table—and smile at each other a lot and are always hanging out on the ice together. Though they sort of did that before they were in love too. D-pairs, you know.

It’s just, sometimes Luc looks at them, and he thinks about Julien Gauthier.

Which is weird, because Luc isn’t even in love with Julien, and Julien probably barely tolerates him after a couple seasons being rivals, but. It’s just that sometimes he thinks he tricks himself into _thinking_ he’s in love with Julien Gauthier.

It’s not until they’re in Val-d’Or for their third meeting that Luc finally gets the courage to ask, “So um, you and Lauz. How’d you know?”

“Hmm?” Phil looks up from his phone, caught off-guard with a mouthful of burrito.

Luc looks around, but the rest of the team is scattered all over the restaurant, and no one’s paying attention to them. Jérémy and Zach are at home, visiting family in the city. It’s just Luc and Phil right now.

“I was wondering how you knew that you and Jér were it for each other.”

After another moment of slow chewing, Phil puts down his burrito and swallows. He takes a drink from his water bottle, fidgets with his fingers, and finally peeks at Luc from under his lashes. It almost looks like he’s...shy? Embarrassed? A little unsure?

“It just felt right,” he starts slowly. “We’ve been teammates for three years now, it’s our last year together in Rouyn before I go to Philly and he goes to Boston. I think...Over the summer, we talked about our feelings and we both decided that we didn’t want to waste any more time.”

Which is very cute and all, but. “How did you _know_ though? That you were in love with Lauz?”

Phil blinks. “I...I don’t know,” he says. “It’s just a feeling.” A smile curves over his mouth, involuntary. “I think about him all the time, and I like spending time with him, even when we’re not doing shit. He’s a good friend. When I think about the future, I want him in it, and—He’s good for me, you know? He’s good for my heart.”

That’s fucking unbearably cute. Luc feels his cheeks flush a little.

“Do you...ever dream about him?”

“About Jér? Yeah, a little, sometimes. I don’t really remember my dreams though. Zach says Jér dreams about me.”

“Oh.” Luc sits back in his chair and picks up his own burrito, but he only stares at it, thinking.

And Phil must guess what the fuck’s going on in his head, because he says kind of gently, “You got someone in mind, Duber?”

“Not—Not really,” Luc says, but it sounds weak even to his ears.

Phil bites his lip and doesn’t press, but the omitted truth hangs in the air between the two of them.

That night, Luc scores two goals against Val-d’Or and gets a primary assist on Gabe’s overtime winner, and he doesn’t even stare at the Foreurs bench too much. Phil gives him a knowing look when Luc rushes through getting dressed and heads out to the Foreurs’ locker room.

It feels fucking awkward to be hanging out a ways from the door, watching as the Val-d’Or players trickle out in small groups, but luckily, Julien is one of the first to leave so Luc isn’t there for like, a weird amount of time.

Julien looks surprised to see him. “Duber, hey what’s up?”

And suddenly, Luc doesn’t know what the fuck to say. He doesn’t even know what he’s doing here, or what he hoped to accomplish tonight. “Hey,” he says carefully. “Um, just wanted to come by and...talk.” Damn, that’s lame.

“Oh, yeah sure. What’s up?”

 _I think I’m in love with you_ , Luc doesn’t know how to say. Because how could he know? He and Julien Gauthier are friends, the way everyone’s friends with each other in the Q. Outside of that though, they don’t really hang out. There’s no reasoning for the way he thinks he feels, besides the fact that he dream-fantasizes about dating him.

God, this was a stupid thing to do. He’s never gonna do something like this on a whim again.

Julien is still staring, so Luc swallows and says, “Just wanted to say good game tonight. You were uh, good.”

“Thanks.” There’s a small smile on Julien’s face. “So were you.”

They’re both silent for a long moment, and it gets awkward super fast.

“So uh, was there anything…?” Julien says, and Luc jumps in quickly, blurts out, “Not really. Just wanted to—” and he makes a gesture that could mean pretty much anything.

“Oh. Uh, I’m gonna head out then.”

“Yeah, yeah. Me too. I think the bus is waiting for me. Um, good night. See you around.”

Jesus Christ. Where the fuck was his legendary chill? He’s halfway down the hall when he hears Julien call out from behind him.

“Oh, and hey Duber?”

Luc turns around, and Julien is still standing where he left him, all his attention focused on Luc. There’s a curl of hair falling in his face, and he looks really fucking handsome. Something in Luc, like his stomach or something, wobbles at the sight of him.

“See you at camp.”

 

 

Despite Julien’s “See you at camp,” they don’t really talk in Boisbriand at all. Luc is absolutely not disappointed about that.

There’s plenty to take his mind off it though, because they have a medal to win, a country’s pride resting on their shoulders after Helsinki—Helsinki and sixth place, un-fucking-acceptable sixth. Hockey is Canada’s sport, and it’s their job to remind the world of it. Maybe it’s better that there are no distractions; World Juniors is stressful enough without whatever is going on in Luc’s head fucking him up.

 

The night they beat Sweden, the night before the gold medal game—

“I love you,” Julien says over and over again, hushed, in the dark. It’s a soft murmur, a mantra pressed against Luc’s face, against his damp cheek, and Luc draws in a shuddering breath and feels the air get trapped in his throat. His heart _hurts_ , so fucking much.

“I love you, I love you,” and it’s a blur of words now, almost meaningless the way words get when you say them over and over, but Luc knows what Julien’s doing, something soft to take the edge off defeat.

He’s all cried out and so is Julien, but the fucking misery’s still there in his chest and his throat and behind his eyes like the worst kind of pressure, all the pent-up emotions that he held back on the ice.

Luc just—gave everything he had, and it wasn’t enough.

Julien’s arms tighten around him, almost too-warm under the covers, but Luc doesn’t care. He closes his eyes and presses his mouth hard to the line of Julien’s shoulder, listens to him whisper how much he loves him, like it’s enough to make up for the weight of silver around their necks.

There are tears in the corners of his eyes when he wakes up, and he wipes them away quickly before Stromer can see. The dream’s not an omen. Luc isn’t going to let it be.

 

Eight minutes left in the third, tied 4-4. Canada on the power play on a delay of game penalty.

Stromer is along the boards, receives the pass from Chabby at the blue line and wrists it neatly, and Luc turns, stick ready, follows the puck with his eyes— _always follow the puck_ —but Parsons drops and the puck skips off his pads and away from the blue paint. The rebound bounces over Luc’s stick, and he bites down hard, spins and starts to go after it but Raddy is there first, puck battle along the boards with McAvoy.

Luc hangs back— _position, position, he knows his role on the PP_ —and when the puck takes a chip off the wall, it comes back to him. And then it’s just him and an American penalty killer swallowing up the shooting lane, but Barz is open, tapping his stick on the ice, and Luc feeds it to him across open ice.

Barz has hands like silk, and he one-touches, shoots—not at the net, Parsons coming hard across the crease, but straight through the American defender and the blue paint and threaded onto the tape of Luc’s stick.

Luc doesn’t think.

He doesn’t think about how if they win, no one will say anything about the two multi-goal leads they gave up, the loss to the Americans in the preliminary round, the way they almost lost in the quarter-finals against the Czechs. He doesn’t think about the clock winding down and the sound of the crowd and the weight of his country on his shoulders. He doesn’t think about gold.

He’s only aware of the ice, the yawning net in front of him, positioned right on the doorstep with the goalie down and out for a heartbeat, a stuttered breath, a prayer.

He’s on the doorstep, and the puck barely has to touch the blade of his stick, Luc is swinging not a second too soon, a tap-in, the easiest thing to do in the world. A gift-wrapped goal against the goalie he defeated in the Mem Cup, and Parsons throws his stick out in a last-ditch desperation move, but he’s too late and the net is open and empty and then it’s not and—

Luc scores, the puck sliding over the line like a dream, like the fulfillment of a thousand dreams.

 

Fucking _gold_. We are the champions. They did it.

Luc is half-drunk and covered in champagne and his face hurts from smiling.

Everyone is talking, cheering, shouting over each other, passing drinks around and not even trying to get undressed. Chabby and Barz are in the corner, taking a dozen selfies with their gold medals clenched between their teeth. Raddy is like, yelling something in Mitchell’s face and shaking him by the shoulders, and Mitchell is shaking his head and shouting back. Stromer might be crying.

Across the room, Julien is shotgunning a beer, smiling so hard his eyes are practically squeezed shut, and he’s fucking lit up like the sun.

For a second, in the middle of their celebrations, Luc imagines arms around him and a mouth pressed to his wet cheek. It would’ve been nice, he thinks. Not the silver medal in his dream, of course. Just like, the feeling of Julien tucked against him under the covers, being comforted, being loved.

But fuck it. They won _gold_.

 

“You’re running out of time,” Andrei Svechnikov is saying.

Luc turns away from him, but the walls are the same, still empty, still white. He reaches out a hand and tries to guess how far away they are. He can’t see any corners, can’t guess where the edges of the room are. It’s just blank whiteness, everywhere he looks. The only thing that interrupts the floating white is Andrei himself.

He turns back to face him. “What do you mean, I’m running out of time?”

“You won,” Andrei says. “The gold medal. That was the last thing you wanted to win, right?”

World Juniors gold. Yeah, that’s the one championship that Luc needed to top off a perfect junior career.

“You’re running out of time now,” Andrei says again, cryptic as shit. He looks sad. “You got everything you wanted, Dubois. And now—”

The walls shatter.

Jérémy is shaking his shoulder, and Luc jerks upright in his seat, banging his elbow on the armrest. Everyone is getting up and grabbing their luggage from the overhead, and a quick look out the window shows that the plane has arrived at Rouyn-Noranda Airport.

He never does get to hear what comes next.

 

 

This year, heading into the playoffs, the Huskies are healthy. They’re firing on all cylinders. The Halifax team they’re facing in the first round is young and inexperienced, and aside from Nico Hischier, it doesn’t really have any all-stars.

Still, it takes six games to put them away. Each game is tight, all but the last of them decided by just one or two goals. Game 5 goes to triple overtime and threatens to put the Huskies in a 3-2 series hole, on the brink of elimination, before Gabe scores on a maybe-high stick that the refs decide is a good goal.

They close out the Mooseheads in Game 6 at home in Rouyn-Noranda, but it leaves a bad taste in Luc’s mouth. The message is clear: this Huskies team isn’t the same one as last year, and the early scare against a much weaker team is very fucking bad.

Their seven-game series against Chicoutimi proves that. It’s high-scoring and thrilling, but they lose Game 7 at home in overtime. It’s a shocking, heartbreaking way to end his junior career.

The locker room is fucking depressing afterward.

At his stall, Jérémy is getting undressed in quick and efficient movements, head bowed. Phil comes over and runs a hand down his back, and Jérémy turns, catches Phil’s hand and twists their fingers together. Comfort. As Luc watches, Jérémy lifts their joined hands and presses his mouth to Phil’s knuckles.

Luc looks away, bending down to unlace his skates.

People have been calling him the magician for years now, the boy with the golden touch, but tonight, he ran out of his usual magic tricks. Luc scored two tournament-winners in the past year, but in Game 7, he came up empty.

And now it’s the end of one chapter of his life. He’s headed off to Montreal; Phil is going to Philly, Jérémy to Boston, Forts to Chicago, Antoine Waked to Montreal with Luc, Gabe Fontaine to New York. They’re family, and they’re splitting up for good now.

Luc just wishes it could’ve ended on a better note.

 

 

“Pierre, prior to the draft, you mentioned that Montreal isn’t your favorite team.”

Luc laughs awkwardly. “Yeah uh it—I mean, I didn’t hate them. I grew up watching the Canadiens, my family and all my friends watched them, and everyone talked about them.”

The Habs beat reporters keep pressing though, and it feels like Luc is suffocating under the pressure of making sure he answers right. Don’t fuck up, don’t say anything to upset the fans, watch every word and movement and breath you take. He knows the drill.

“Would you say your feelings about the Canadiens have changed?”

“Yeah I mean, I’m grateful to the Canadiens for drafting me and giving me the opportunity to play in the NHL.” He licks his lips and picks his words carefully. “It’s amazing to be playing in Montreal. It’s a great team.”

“You were born in Sainte-Agathe-des-Monts, just outside Montreal. So would you consider this a homecoming of sorts?”

“Yeah for sure, I mean, I moved around a lot when I was young, lived in Georgia and Germany for a while, and Rimouski for a few years. My dad’s coaching in Manitoba right now, but my parents just bought a house in Montreal this summer. So yeah it’s kind of—kinda like coming back, uh huh.”

“Pierre, Marc Bergevin drafted you last year to fill a hole at center. What are your thoughts on that heading into the season?”

Luc takes a breath and catches the sigh before it rushes out of him. This is normal; this is what it’s like to play in a market like Montreal. “Uh, I can play all three forward positions. I’ve been playing wing for years, but Rouyn moved me to center halfway into my draft year and it’s something I’ve been working on…”

 

 

Things in Montreal are. Weird. That’s the only way to put things, really.

The Canadiens start him at center, and Luc knows he’s spent the past year and a half learning the new position, but it’s _different_ playing center at the NHL level. It’s harder to take draws and defend, and the guys are bigger and hit harder and are much, much faster than anyone Luc ever played in the Q.

He gets tossed from the circle a lot, though to be honest, he doesn’t really know the faceoff rules and what constitutes a violation.

Mostly he’s just like, really confused, and out of his depth.

 

Dream-Luc is struggling a bit on the Blue Jackets. Dream-Luc is having a hard time of it in the preseason, and it shows in the way he plays, decent—just decent. He feels lost out there, sometimes, caught out of position. He doesn’t click with the guys on his wings, and everything’s too much at once.

“If it’s too much responsibility too soon, talk to Torts about it,” Josh Anderson tells him.

The words get caught in Luc’s throat. He doesn’t _want_ it to be too much responsibility. It feels like failure, admitting that he’s not ready.

“You know that Torts was talking about that over the summer, right?” Josh says, kind of gently. “It was like, unofficial stuff, how they were gonna handle you. They do it for all the rookies. Torts wanted to bring you in slowly as a wing, until you were comfortable. It’s not the end of the world if you can’t play center right away.”

It feels like Luc can breathe a little easier.

He’s back on the left wing in the next game, and he feels—good. Like he can do this.

 

It’s harder to talk to Claude Julien. CJ has a way of things, a method that he won’t budge about. The Canadiens need Luc at center; that’s what they drafted him for, and that’s what he’s going to deliver.

So Luc plays center in Montreal.

 

 

“You know, you really like being all mysterious and shit,” Luc says, frowning.

Andrei Svechnikov spreads his hands. He’s grown since the last time Luc saw him, put on some weight, even though that was only a few months ago. Though it sort of makes Luc wonder about dream physics. Like, how does growing even work when it’s all happening in your head? Do people like, grow old in your dreams?

“You keep waking up before I can talk to you,” Andrei says. “It’s really hard to find you in your dreams. And then you run away from me and I have to wait another couple months before I can talk to you again.”

“Sorry,” Luc mutters.

“I’ve been trying to tell you that you’re running out of time. But I’m—I think I’m too late. I don’t really know what you wished for.”

“What I what?”

“What you wished for, when you made your wish. That’s why you’re living this—” Andrei waves his hand around. “This isn’t what the world’s supposed to be like. The past couple years, they weren’t supposed to happen this way.”

Luc blinks. “The past couple years were fine by me.”

“Exactly.” Andrei gives him a meaningful kind of stare.

“...I don’t get it.”

“This is a fantasy. You made a wish, probably something to do with winning all those tournaments, and now you’re living out that fantasy. You know it.”

“You’re fucking nuts, man.”

Andrei's face is pitying now, which is starting to really piss Luc off. “You know it’s wrong. You feel it too, don’t you? Like you expect one thing to happen and another does. Or you dream about different things. Different teams.”

And that hits like way, way too close to home. “ _This_ is a dream.” Yeah, Luc knows. Luc figures shit out too.

“The dreams are real. Everything else is not. Everything else is... _That’s_ the good dream. It’s going to change soon though, if it hasn’t already. It always does. It always catches up to you.”

Luc swallows. This feels. Bad. Ugly. Like the ground he’s standing on is suddenly unsteady. But he can’t stop focusing on—

“You’re not—Dude, you’re not saying that I fantasized about winning all those championships. Those things really happened.”

“In this world, yes. They weren’t supposed to though. You weren’t supposed to win any of it.”

And that’s fucking bullshit, because. “No I—I _earned_ that shit. The President’s Cup, the Mem Cup, the gold medal, I earned all that.” Luc’s really pissed now, cause who the fuck is this kid to tell him he’s not supposed to win any of it? It’s insulting.

“You earned them in this world, but it’s still not right. And things...They never stay good. The wishes are never good, Pierre-Luc Dubois. Up to you if it’s worth it or not.”

“That’s bullshit. That’s—This is all bullshit. This is a fucking dream. None of what you’re saying is real or—or—”

Luc hisses out a breath and turns away, and when he turns back, Svechnikov is gone.

 

 

_Le CHat avec Phillip Danault et Pierre-Luc Dubois_

“Hello everybody, I’m Phillip Danault, and here’s my friend Pierre-Luc Dubois. We’re going to do a little CHat today.”

“Hey guys.”

“So, Pierre. Before we get started, this is your first season in Montreal and we’re really excited you’re here with us. The fans want to know more about you, so why don’t you tell us a little about yourself?”

“Oh uh, there’s not much really. I’m 19 years old, from Ste-Agathe-des-Monts. I play center. Um, I like golfing and watching baseball, and…”

 

Sometimes, he lays in bed at night and thinks about dumb things, like how he doesn’t really fit in on the team and whether his early struggles at center are his own fault or the fault of poor coaching. Things that nag at him and keep him awake.

Sometimes, he thinks about Andrei Svechnikov’s words, even though he really shouldn’t, because it was just a fucking dream.

He catches himself wondering like, _Do I really deserve everything I’ve got?_ before he kicks the thought soundly in the nuts. Because it’s a stupid thought. He’s got a sparkling resume. Everything in his life has worked out perfectly so far, and he worked hard for all of it, damn it. He’s proud of what he’s accomplished and who he is.

And what Andrei Svechnikov said, about how he wasn’t supposed to win any of it...Is he even the same person without those cups, without the gold medal in his trophy case at home?

He rolls over and pulls the covers up, tucking them around his neck and closing his eyes.

This is stupid and going in circles. He knows who he is.

 

Pierre-Luc Dubois: President’s Cup Champion, Memorial Cup Champion, World Juniors gold medalist, Montreal Canadiens player.

If only it didn't feel so...wrong.

 

 

Luc is fucking miserable in Montreal. They lose and lose, and Carey Price gets injured less than twenty games into the season, and the lines are inconsistent and underproducing, and no one is happy. Their fans don’t accept anything but excellence from them; the media is an ever-present shadow. Luc feels like he’s gonna break at any second.

He doesn't dream about Andrei Svechnikov anymore.

He doesn't dream about much at all.

 

The Habs lose in Tampa, a huge fucking blowout loss, 7-1 with an ugly breakdown in the third period. Kucherov breaks some record or other as usual and Drouin scores his first career NHL hat trick, and Luc chews his mouthguard and watches the hats rain down on the ice.

“Well that’s awkward,” Chucky says softly.

Luc grunts. Everyone is well fucking aware of the awkward connection between Luc and Jonathan Drouin. The trade rumors had been everywhere all summer, after all: speculation that Luc and Drouin were both part of some kind of deal that eventually fell through because the Lightning wanted a defenseman and the Canadiens wanted a group of players, with Drouin replacing Luc’s centering role on the top line.

It hadn’t been more than rumor, but Marc Bergevin said some dumb shit that just fanned the flames, and Luc spent half the summer wondering if he needed to buy beachwear for Tampa.

What a way to start his NHL career, eh.

The next game is better, no #narrative for people to write home about. The Canadiens are in Columbus to wrap up their roadie, and it’s a closer game this time. The team is playing better after a tough shootout loss against Florida and then the embarrassing loss against Tampa.

But Luc can’t focus for some reason. It should be a routine game, but he feels like he’s seeing double on the ice, and he’s slower than usual. He has to shake himself after every shift, trying to clear his head. There’s pressure behind his eyes, hot and painful, and he blinks away the vision of himself in navy blue.

He wins the draw against Foligno but turns the puck over to Josh Anderson, and then Matt Tkachuk, third overall pick in the 2016 draft, puts the puck behind Pricey for the go-ahead goal.

“What the hell was what?” Patches asks. He’s heated, and Luc can’t really blame him.

He doesn’t really have an answer for his captain.

That was an unforgivable turnover for a first line center. Especially a first line center who’s expected to save the franchise, to turn this sinking ship around and bring the Cup back to Quebec. That’s what Luc is supposed to be for. He knows.

CJ keeps him benched almost the entire third period, and Luc thinks he probably plays four minutes total in the last forty minutes.

They lose to the Blue Jackets, the Tkachuk goal standing as the game-winner. One point of a possible six on the road. Not good enough. Nowhere fucking close.

The room is strained, and Luc gets dressed as fast as possible and avoids looking at anyone.

On the bus back to the hotel, he opens up Instagram and stares at gauths12’s pictures.

They’re friends, of course. Everyone’s friends with everyone in the Q. They don’t talk a ton, but they don’t really have a reason to. Julien Gauthier is pretty disinterested in Luc, and they don’t see much of each other. It’s always felt like there’s something in the way whenever they strike up a conversation.

His instagram is nice though. Lot of shirtless pictures by the pool. Some Team Canada stuff, some Hurricanes stuff. Workout videos. Pictures of him with his two President’s Cups with Val-d’Or and Saint John. Luc has already liked most of the posts while aimlessly scrolling through social media, but he lingers over them now.

He can’t explain it, but it just feels like Julien Gauthier is missing a few pictures.

Julien doesn’t really post about his private life at all. It’s almost all hockey. No pictures of himself at home, or on a date, or hanging out with someone. Girlfriend. Boyfriend, maybe. No picture of him holding hands at Niagara Falls, backwards snapbacks and scrunched up noses and smiling into the kiss. No funny emoji caption on joint workouts in his basement. No video of him sitting down to a nice dinner out with...with...

There should be pictures. His page feels wrong and empty without them.

(Luc’s instagram looks wrong too, all wrong. Not enough yellow, he thinks. No fucking clue why he feels that way; he doesn’t even like yellow all that much. His pictures from his time in Rouyn are fantastic but it’s just—he’s missing the yellow.

He’s missing the yellow, and so much more.)

Luc is fucking going insane.

He opens up a DM and thinks about what to say, something chill and not weird. But in the end, he closes the app and puts his phone away, message unsent.

 

_Hey Jules. Think I miss knowing you. Think I miss loving you too._

 

 

They’re not going to make the playoffs. It’s March, and there’s a month of hockey left, and they’re one game from being mathematically eliminated. Luc isn’t thinking about it. He’s not thinking about the heartbreaking losses or the uncomfortable feeling in the locker room or the pressure on all sides, squeezing the air out of him. He’s not thinking about the questions he can’t answer or the ugly truths he’s had to admit to journalists all season: about himself, about the team, about effort and consistency and _why the fuck aren’t we good enough?_

He’s not thinking about the way Don Cherry ripped him apart on Hockey Night in Canada last Saturday or how he can’t search his name on twitter or the fact that he had to disable comments on instagram. He isn’t thinking about any of that at all. The season’s almost over.

Luc is just. Tired.

 

 **Arpon Basu** @ArponBasu: Had a chance to sit down with Pierre-Luc Dubois today:  theathletic.com/165320/2017/033 ...

 **Sean Brown** @brownieboy: Why is this guy still on our first line? Clear he’s not a center. He can’t do any wrong though, Habs need their French darling

 **Dean Spicer** @deanspice: @brownieboy He was an ok center in juniors, bad coaching here

 **Becca** @habs_kid: lol this kid sucks two points in last ten games lol. keep saying mb should’ve taken sergachev in the draft

 **Andrew Surry** @surrywonder: What do you think about the rumors that he got a girl pregnant and that’s why MB is shopping him?

 **Olivier Boucher** @allezmontreal: Dubois est l’un des problèmes sur les #Habs. Mais cette équipe est terrible avec ou sans lui

 

 

Luc doesn’t know how to do the whole stalking someone via dreams thing, so he does the only thing he knows how to do: he waits until the Canadiens have an off day, and then he tracks down the Barrie Colts. They’re in Windsor playing the Spitfires tonight, so Luc gets on a plane and literally flies the fuck down to Windsor, Ontario. (He has to double back on the way to the airport because he forgot his passport, and he’s not leaving the country, but he doesn’t like traveling without it.)

In Windsor, it’s pretty easy to find out where the Colts are hanging out. Luc has done the whole major junior thing for years; he knows how to spot a road team. And then it’s as easy as catching the nearest OHL kid and asking him where his teammate is.

“I’m goalie for the Spits, actually,” Mikey DiPietro says. “You didn’t know? Oh c’mon, Duber.”

“Fuck. Sorry,” Luc says. He can’t always keep non-Q teams straight in his head. “I’m looking for Andrei Svechnikov.”

“Dunno where he is. I’m only here to hang out with my buddy. But if you’re looking for someone from Barrie, Suzuki there’s your guy.”

Ryan Suzuki is a lot more helpful. “Oh, Svechkin went to see his brother. He’s been looking forward to this game for ages, ever since he found out how close Windsor and Detroit are. I can text him and ask for an address if you’re looking for him?”

Which sends Luc on another wild chase across the river and into the heart of Detroit—thank god for his passport—until he’s standing in front of what is apparently the apartment of Evgeny Svechnikov. First round draft pick of the Detroit Red Wings in the 2015 draft. Former Cape Breton Screaming Eagle. Luc’s hand hesitates in front of the doorbell.

Former Cape Breton Screaming Eagle. Yeah, he played on a line with Max Lazarev and...and who else?

 _Me_ , Luc thinks, but that was in his crazy dreams; he means in reality. But no matter how hard he thinks, he can’t remember who else Evgeny Svechnikov played with in Cape Breton, even though they were one of the best lines in the league at the time.

He rings the bell.

Evgeny opens the door, grinning wide and gap-toothed and a little confused. “Hi!” he says, even though it’s clear that he has no fucking clue why Luc is standing on his doorstep.

“Hey man,” Luc says hesitantly.

He’s not really sure how to start. Like, does he just launch into _I have dreams about your brother—not those kinds—and I need to talk to him right away_ or should he ease the guy into this? Is the real life Andrei even the same as the one in his dreams? There’s a huge chance that Andrei Svechnikov is gonna hear what Luc says about alternate universes or whatever and call the cops. Or Claude Julien.

And then Andrei appears over his shoulder, and Luc takes one look at his face and knows he’s come to the right place.

 

“I don’t dream about you anymore,” he says.

Andrei folds his arms across his chest. He’s lost some weight since Luc last dreamt about him in November, the long grind of the season wearing away at him the way it does for everyone. He’s gonna need to put some of that weight back on for the draft.

“Is too hard,” Andrei says. “Takes very much energy.”

He’s got a pretty thick Russian accent, and he’s struggling with his words in a way that Luc doesn’t remember from his dreams. They both seem to be aware of it at the same time, because Andrei drops his arms and says kind of self-consciously, “In dream we speak Russian.”

“But I understand you.”

“Is dream.” Andrei shrugs.

Evgeny watches them, eyes bright with curiosity. “What dream?”

“Your brother stalks me when I’m asleep,” Luc says. He turns back to Andrei. “Last time, you said that this world is a fantasy. That I made it up. I thought you were fucking crazy but—”

“Don’t talk so fast,” Evgeny cuts in. “Andrei is still learning English.”

“Sorry. Last time we talked, you said that the world isn’t right. I believe you.”

Andrei looks to Evgeny on the other side of the couch, and Evgeny immediately translates for him. And then he’s nodding, shoulders relaxing. He suddenly looks looser than he did in any of Luc’s dreams, more open.

Luc continues. “But Montreal wasn't part of the fantasy. I don’t know what I wished for. Maybe a championship, maybe a couple gold medals. Maybe I just wanted to stop losing. But Montreal—This wasn’t what I wanted.”

More Russian between the brothers.

"You have to sacrifice," Andrei says.

“He says that there is a trade-off.” Evgeny nods. “Yes! A trade-off. Always a trade-off.” He asks Andrei a question, and Andrei shoots back an answer and shakes his head.

“So what, I give up being happy in the NHL for a couple junior prizes? How the fuck is that fair?”

“Andrei says, he says ‘Magic isn’t fair.’”

“I didn’t do any magic. I don’t...think I did magic?”

“You made a wish on—Andrei,” and Evgeny says something quickly to his brother, probably asking for clarification, because he’s gotta be fucking confused as shit now. He’s a good sport about it though and doesn’t interrupt with his own questions too much. “A wish on the moon? You made a wish on the moon.”

“The fucking _moon_ did this?”

“Sinyaya luna,” Andrei says. "Special kind of moon."

Evgeny frowns, thoughtful. “We call it sinyaya luna in Russia. It’s...how do you say in English...a blue moon, maybe? Do you call it blue moon in English?”

Fuck. Luc failed Grade 7 earth sciences. “Like...a full moon?” Is that what a blue moon is?

“Yeah!” Evgeny grins at him, pleased. “Like that.”

“So everything that I’ve been dreaming about, that’s all what’s supposed to be happening really. Like playing for the Screaming Eagles and getting drafted to Columbus and losing at World Juniors. And everything in this world, timeline, whatever—That’s all fake.”

Evgeny translates more slowly this time, and they go back in forth in Russian for a bit, probably Andrei finally filling Evgeny in on the magic and wishes and other freaky shit going on here. Luc waits for them to be done. It takes a long time. Evgeny takes it well though, obviously trusting his brother not to be a lunatic.

“Andrei says that this is like, another timeline. You wished to win, but you didn’t know how your wish would come true. My brother says that the magic changes only one little thing, and the whole world changes.”

And Luc remembers, unexpectedly, the feeling of pulling on his Huskies jersey for the first time at the Q draft in Sherbrooke. The pride, but also the feeling of something being off. The missing yellow.

“I was supposed to be a Screaming Eagle,” he says slowly. “The Eagles were supposed to draft me in the first round with the—” He stops suddenly. God. Fuck. One little thing. “The fifth overall pick. The Nicolas Roy compensation pick.”

Because Nico Roy _did_ report to Cape Breton after saying for months that he wouldn’t, and the Screaming Eagles didn’t get the compensation pick in the 2014 draft, and they never drafted Luc with it. And Luc never played for them on a line with Evgeny Svechnikov and Maxim Lazarev in Cape Breton, and he never lost in the quarter-finals the year the Huskies won the President’s Cup, and he never was drafted third overall to Columbus, and he never missed the open net in the gold-medal game and then lost in the shootout on a failed prayer, a shootout resting on Nico Roy’s shoulders, and—and—

It feels like he’s suffocating, the double memories crashing down, and Luc is officially freaked the fuck out. He gets out of his seat and takes a lap of the room to cool down, and then another lap, and another one, until he gets his head back on straight.

“Okay. Okay.” His hands are shaking a little, and he clenches them at his sides. “How do you even know about all this?”

“You're not the only one who made a wish,” Evgeny says, translating one sentence at a time as Andrei feeds him his answers. “My brother wanted things too. Him, or Rasmus Dahlin.”

God. The fucking draft. Of course. Dahlin or Svechnikov, first overall in 2018.

“I Detroyt,” Andrei adds.

That, Luc doesn’t need a translation for. _And Detroit_. Being drafted to Detroit with his brother.

Andrei doesn't say anything else about his choice and what came after, but he doesn't have to. Luc wonders which timeline he's living now, whether he likes it.

“Why me though? I'm sure there are a couple people who’ve made wishes or whatever, changed their timelines.” Andrei half-shrugs and half-nods, and Luc frowns, thinking. “What I don’t get is why you tried so hard to track me down and fix my wish. Like...why’d you try so hard to warn me? You don’t even know me.”

Andrei’s eyes flick to his brother when he hears what Luc says. He says something in fast Russian, and Evgeny goes still. Says something back, sharp but quickly going softer, super soft and gentle. As he talks, he slides across the couch until he’s next to Andrei.

“Oh, Andrei,” Evgeny says. He puts his arms around his brother.

“Zhenya,” Andrei says back.

Some more Russian and hugging. When they break apart, Andrei nods in Luc’s direction.

"Because for Zhenya. Because I love Zhenya."

It takes some time for Evgeny to find the words. “Andrei says, he said—I’m your friend. And that I’m unhappy here, or less happy than I used to be. He says that I’m happier when I know you.”

And Luc know that’s true, from memories that aren’t his own. The epic friendship between him and Evgeny Svechnikov, two years and over a hundred games together. How many goals did they connect on? How many seconds did they spend together, best friends, inseparable?

And if that’s true, then everything else is true too. Like Cape Breton, like Columbus, like—

 _Julien_ , his heart says, before Luc can shut that voice up.

"Zhenya more happy in other world, so I have to find you." On the couch, Andrei squeezes Evgeny’s hand, shooting him a smile.

Luc doesn’t think he’s ever seen Andrei smile before, though it’s pretty understandable since he was trying to tell Luc to un-fuck the world. It’s a nice smile, kind of goofy and sweet, and it lights up his whole face. He looks more natural like this. Less pinched. It makes Luc wonder how much he’s stressed this kid out.

Andrei adds something else in Russian, and Evgeny says, “And you’re happier too. You _make_ yourself happier.”

“So how do I go back?”

“Do you _want_ to go back to how everything was?”

“I thought you wanted me to. For your brother.”

“It has to be your choice. You’re giving up everything here. You have to really, really want to go back.”

Does he? He remembers the feel of the Memorial Cup in his hands, cool metal, heavy, the handles clenched in his hands as he drank out of it. Remembers the feeling of gold clenched between his teeth. He’s not just taking those away from himself—He’s taking them away from his teams, from the Huskies and from Canada.

But they weren’t ever supposed to win those in the first place. None of this was supposed to be theirs. It fucking hurts to admit it.

And the Habs—The CH was never meant to be his. It’s someone else’s, and Luc suddenly can’t bear the thought of living in someone else’s skin for another second.

“I know how good I am,” he says carefully. He swallows and focuses on a spot over Andrei’s shoulder, because it’s easier than looking him in the face with his knowing eyes. “I don’t need gold or any Cups to know that. I’m going to earn them myself, the way it’s supposed to be.” He thinks about Evgeny and Julien. “And I want my friends back.”

Evgeny translates for him, and then Andrei speaks his next words directly to Luc, simple words.

“You really wish?”

“I—Yes.”

 

 

Luc is so fucking tired of losing and losing, and he just wants to win something, to prove that he’s really the player everyone says he is. That he’s worthy of being drafted third after Matthews and Laine, that he was the right choice for Columbus.

Every tournament since Ivan Hlinka has ended in heartbreak for him: the shootout against Team USA, being swept by Saint John in the President’s Cup final, losing to Team USA again this summer in the Summer Showcase, losing in the finals of the Traverse City prospect tournament. And then tonight, Columbus hosting Tampa and losing in overtime, the latest L in their five-game losing skid. It’s during times like these that the weight of all his failures presses down on him.

He just—He just wishes he could win something for once.

Through the window, he can see the moon, big and round and glowing white in the darkness. It’s partially covered by the trees outside Savy’s house, but the light still reaches into the bedroom, spread over Luc’s face.

He just wishes he could win.

 

“Avec notre premier choix, les Huskies de Rouyn-Noranda sont fiers de sélectionner Pierre-Luc Dubois…With our first choice, the Rouyn-Noranda Huskies are proud to select...”

 

 

And then Luc blinks, and—

 

He’s sitting in his stall, phones and mics in his face, and someone is thanking him for answering their questions.

“Thank you,” he says on automatic, as the cameras turn away.

Across the room, Bob grins at him and gives him an exaggerated thumbs up. Nick comes back over and thumps him on the back, friendly and proud, like a father.

“Great job tonight, Luc. Great goal,” he says.

Luc looks down at the kepi in his hands. He is wearing dark blue, his usual Reebok undershirt, and when he looks around the room, he sees—

“Oh,” he says softly, and things just click back into place when he sees the navy blue jerseys, the huge star and stripes of the logo on the floor of the dressing room.

 

His name is Pierre-Luc Dubois, formerly of the Cape Breton Screaming Eagles, traded to the Blainville-Boisbriand Armada, and now playing for the Columbus Blue Jackets. He has never had a 100 point season. He has never won a President’s Cup, never won a Memorial Cup, never won World Juniors gold.

In his junior career, over now, he has never brought a championship to Cape Breton.

He’d thought the pain of it wouldn’t be bearable, but it feels okay, he thinks. A bittersweet memory, but hockey wasn’t the only thing he did in the Q. He doesn’t know how he could’ve erased Cape Breton from his life like that; it feels right again, knowing who he is, knowing where he’s from.

Luc takes a small breath.

 

Julien is waiting for him in the hallway, game-day suit neat, hair combed, smile on his face. He looks like the best thing Luc’s seen in a long time.

“Hey. Good game,” he says.

It takes an insane amount of willpower to not run to him, because Luc is chill, damn it, and he’s not like, in one of those chick flicks where the girl and the guy run and jump into each other’s arms in slo-mo in the middle of a daisy field. He does a fast walk though.

“I was wondering if I can come—mmm.”

And Luc doesn’t hear what Julien was wondering, just fits his mouth to Julien’s and bites his bottom lip and licks into his mouth, hot and wet and hungry and fuck it, fuck the Memorial Cup, fuck World Juniors gold. He gets a handful of Julien’s coat and holds him close, kisses him until his mind blanks out.

He has no idea how much time they spend making out in some random hallway in Nationwide Arena, but Julien’s mouth is red when they stop, and Luc’s mouth feels kind of tender. He can’t stop smiling.

“Oh, nice,” Julien says, breathless. “We should play you more often.”

“I missed you. And I’m glad the Canes called you up.”

“So does that mean I can come over?”

“Oh. Yeah. I’ll let Savy know to expect you.” Luc pulls out his phone, and there’s a text from Evgeny on his phone, a huge long string of emojis congratulating him on the goal. He grins to himself when he sees it.

He’s almost dizzy with how light he feels.

The parking garage is mostly empty, just a few arena staff left, and Luc’s car is in its usual corner. (Savy left earlier, rushing home to the kids.) Luc is unlocking the driver’s door when he realizes that Julien is hovering behind him instead of waiting at the other door.

He turns around, feels a smile starting all over again when he sees his boyfriend. “What?”

“You look really good. Really happy.”

And like seriously, how can Luc not drag him in and kiss him again?

“Mon aigle,” Julien whispers, and the words get swallowed up in the barely-there space between their mouths.

Outside the parking garage, the moon shines down on Columbus, full and bright.

 

 

> We are an island, a rock in a stream. We are a people as proud as there’s been…and Pierre Luc…Cape Breton sure is proud of you, son.
> 
> _[Pierre Luc Dubois — A Story From Home](http://leafshub.com/pierre-luc-dubois-a-story-from-home/) _

**Author's Note:**

> I feel like I owe a few people apologies: to Nicolas Roy, for taking him from Chicoutimi and putting him in Cape Breton where he never wanted to be; to Matt Tkachuk and the London Knights, whose Memorial Cup I stole from them; to the American WJC Team, whose well-deserved gold medal I gave to the Canadians. Sorry about that
> 
> And to Pierre-Luc Dubois: wow. I fucking love you
> 
>  
> 
> __  
> [Pierre-Luc Dubois& Evgeny Svechnikov, 2014 QMJHL Draft](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DX1MfLZV4AA8f6u.jpg)  
> 


End file.
